The Isipingo Wastewater Treatment Works

Isipingo WWTW is the site for the proposed Black Soldier Fly processing plant being commissioned by Biocycle under the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant managed by Khanyisa Projects and Partners in Development. The PRG is a team member of the consortium (which also includes EWS) and provide input into the project design and site development. In addition, the PRG are responsible for the monitoring and evaluation of the project.

Black Soldier Fly (BSF) larvae are voracious consumers of organic waste and manures. BSF are a non-pest species as the adult flies do not eat or congregate around a food source in the way that other flies (e.g. Musca domestica – the domestic fly) often do. Adult BSFs live between four and eight days while the pupae and larvae live an average of four to six weeks during which they increase their weight up to 150 times.

When ready to pupate the BSF prepupae migrate from their food source in search of a suitable pupation site and are easily collected in tins or buckets for further processing. Prepaupa can be fed to chicken or fish directly or further processed into animal feed, or even oil for biodiesel production (www.thebiocycle.com).